Aviate interview. Weird HR question to discuss.

[JordanD]

Years ago, in a period of my life where interviews were a thing, I was party to an interview that had a dozen or so questions that were obviously created by some HR department with a sense of self-importance.

It was the day after Saint Patrick’s Day and I was hung over, perhaps still drunk. My feet were so swollen that I wore Sperry Topsiders with my suit, I couldn’t get my Johnston Murphy’s on.

While in the lobby waiting for the interview, I decided that my sweaty face and bloodshot eyes would not present well. Also, I feared throwing up during the interview. I was standing up to leave when my name was called.

No longer caring about the job, I removed my suit jacket and loosened my tie as the interview began. I hadn’t planned on this act of survival being received as an act of confidence.

The interviewers had this long list of dumb questions that only a dull-average HR wonk could create.

I remember my response to one question about handling an employee that needed to be disciplined for some infraction. In my answer, I suggested that the company probably had a policy that included a poorly conceived policy of progressive discipline and I would likely follow that policy. The response drew chuckles - I had an audience. My interviewers hated this crap.

Faced with the next dumb question, I shook my head and said, “next question”.

They laughed and wrapped up the interview. Surprisingly, I got the job .

"Just a straight shooter with upper management written all over him."

 

[mightynimbus]

Hello pilots. I'm currently working on CFI and I actually applied and got interview for aviate program.

So until the day of the interview, I heard many examples and expectations from CFI's in my collage. Both someone who have applied, and who is in it. I tried to practice and prepared for it. But unfortunately I did not get in.

During the interview, I had a question saying "Tell me about the time when you made someone respected." At first, I really got confused. Like am I supposed to tell when "I" made someone respect "me"? I asked to the interviewers to make it sure. And they said yes.

I was still struggling and tried to pull out some words from my memories. I told about my experience as I have lived in all over the place in the world so I have an understanding to different people different culture and stuff. and that made someone respect me.

*I'm still 20 and dont have a career with aviation. So HR questions' answers would be mostly from my flight training and my non-aviation stories.

What was I supposed to talk about? What are they expecting from this question? I want to be more prepared for the interview next year so I would like some advices here please .

There was this day, in Council Bluffs Iowa, I think it was windy.
I was picking up groceries at Hy-Vee.
When I was checking out, I looked down and noticed I had 13 items, but was in the 12 item or less lane.
I immediately put my stuff back in the basket and moved to a different lane.

.....when do I start?

 

[ClearedForOption]

There was this day, in Council Bluffs Iowa, I think it was windy.
I was picking up groceries at Hy-Vee.
When I was checking out, I looked down and noticed I had 13 items, but was in the 12 item or less lane.
I immediately put my stuff back in the basket and moved to a different lane.

.....when do I start?

I was in Ralph's. 18 or 19 items in my cart. No one else in line, no one nearby... went to the 15 or less lane. Cashier counts my items and starts arguing with me. I point out back that their job is to check out customers, not police arbitrary restrictions when no one else is using the lane... and the lane was clear. More pushback ensues. I go full Karen and offer to get a manager. Eventually, my transaction is completed.

Respect was earned by bachelors and househusbands throughout the free world. Zombie Adam Smith rises from the grave to give me a high-five.

Not only do I want to know when I start, I'm ready for a raise.

 

[mightynimbus]

I was in Ralph's. 18 or 19 items in my cart. No one else in line, no one nearby... went to the 15 or less lane. Cashier counts my items and starts arguing with me. I point out back that their job is to check out customers, not police arbitrary restrictions when no one else is using the lane... and the lane was clear. More pushback ensues. I go full Karen and offer to get a manager. Eventually, my transaction is completed.

Respect was earned by bachelors and househusbands throughout the free world. Zombie Adam Smith rises from the grave to give me a high-five.

Not only do I want to know when I start, I'm ready for a raise.

- "This will be 2 seperate transactions, these 4 things are for my elderly grandmother"

 

[MikeD]

I was in Ralph's. 18 or 19 items in my cart. No one else in line, no one nearby... went to the 15 or less lane. Cashier counts my items and starts arguing with me. I point out back that their job is to check out customers, not police arbitrary restrictions when no one else is using the lane... and the lane was clear. More pushback ensues. I go full Karen and offer to get a manager. Eventually, my transaction is completed.

Respect was earned by bachelors and househusbands throughout the free world. Zombie Adam Smith rises from the grave to give me a high-five.

Not only do I want to know when I start, I'm ready for a raise.

19 items in the 15 or less lane? My god, you felon!

 

[SteveC]

I've told this story here before, but I once took a thermodynamics 2 midterm with a pencil that ran out of lead, and transitioned to a pen (my only other available writing device). Engineers in here know what a nightmare taking such a test in pen is. I passed though, somehow

Thermgoddamnics.

 

[KLB]

"Hopefully I've earned of the respect if all my peers just work day to day. But one time XXXX happened and I managed to do XXXX to fullfill the mission. My supervisor was suprised that I managed to quickly recognize the issue and execute XXXX. I received an email/phone call personally thanking me for accomplishing XXXX"

It's good having atleast one "That one time that I saved the day" tool in your bag for interviews.

 

[Snuggle]

19 items in the 15 or less lane? My god, you felon!

The real felony

 

[Hammertime]

Hello pilots. I'm currently working on CFI and I actually applied and got interview for aviate program.

So until the day of the interview, I heard many examples and expectations from CFI's in my collage. Both someone who have applied, and who is in it. I tried to practice and prepared for it. But unfortunately I did not get in.

During the interview, I had a question saying "Tell me about the time when you made someone respected." At first, I really got confused. Like am I supposed to tell when "I" made someone respect "me"? I asked to the interviewers to make it sure. And they said yes.

I was still struggling and tried to pull out some words from my memories. I told about my experience as I have lived in all over the place in the world so I have an understanding to different people different culture and stuff. and that made someone respect me.

*I'm still 20 and dont have a career with aviation. So HR questions' answers would be mostly from my flight training and my non-aviation stories.

What was I supposed to talk about? What are they expecting from this question? I want to be more prepared for the interview next year so I would like some advices here please .

Sorry to hear about your experience. As you can tell from the others you've triggered, you are not the only one. The interview process for the airline world is frustrating.

What they are trying to do is find a way through sitting down with you for a few minutes to figure out if you are the kind of person who is going to make the other guy go directly to the Chief Pilot's office after a 5+ hour transcon, and go "this guy is a total (insert your favorite epithet here)."

There's not real way to do that in an interview, because you clearly aren't going to launch into your theories on (insert your favorite conspiracy here) in a job interview. So, they ask dumb questions like that.

I think:

"Hopefully I've earned of the respect if all my peers just work day to day. But one time XXXX happened and I managed to do XXXX to fullfill the mission. My supervisor was suprised that I managed to quickly recognize the issue and execute XXXX. I received an email/phone call personally thanking me for accomplishing XXXX"

It's good having atleast one "That one time that I saved the day" tool in your bag for interviews.

is a good response. Think of a time you were able to get a student over something they were stuck on. Maybe a buddy came to you and said, "I've got this student that can't do a steep turn to save their life" and you were able to help. Or you were able to complete a training event despite adverse weather (...legally!)

I have some little experience with Aviate, but not from your end of it. Not going to speak against it at all. It got me a great job. But, there are many other paths as well. I don't know what the current rules are on reinterviewing, but I've heard that with a little luck, going to an AA wholly owned, you can either jump straight to UA as an off the street hire or to Frontier or Spirit within a year. Then another 6 months to a year at a LCC, you should be a shoo-in. UA is aggressively hiring from LCCs.

 

[Acadia]

That was a clumsy way to ask that question. I have interviewed a lot of people over the years (not in aviation) and I get the intention of questions like that. It is really more about demonstrating maturity and life experience, which are valid qualities to look for in addition to job specific skills. I could see myself asking something along those lines, but perhaps wording it like "Can you share an experience where you think you earned someones respect?"

Related but mostly off topic, this reminded me of my only airline interview back in 2005. I am sure I am butchering this, but somewhere in there I got a question along the lines of "What makes you think you are ready to become an airline FO with only 1400hrs (or whatever the number was in that ballpark)?" My honest first response with smile... "Because I have more than twice the hours most of your current captains got hired with!" Of course I followed that up with a more legit answer, but I did get offered the job (which I turned down).

 

[Screaming_Emu]

That was a clumsy way to ask that question. I have interviewed a lot of people over the years (not in aviation) and I get the intention of questions like that. It is really more about demonstrating maturity and life experience, which are valid qualities to look for in addition to job specific skills. I could see myself asking something along those lines, but perhaps wording it like "Can you share an experience where you think you earned someones respect?"

Related but mostly off topic, this reminded me of my only airline interview back in 2005. I am sure I am butchering this, but somewhere in there I got a question along the lines of "What makes you think you are ready to become an airline FO with only 1400hrs (or whatever the number was in that ballpark)?" My honest first response with smile... "Because I have more than twice the hours most of your current captains got hired with!" Of course I followed that up with a more legit answer, but I did get offered the job (which I turned down).

I think TMAAT questions are also a good way to judge self awareness. I’d imagine it’s pretty easy to judge a “canned” or even a fake story from one that the interviewee actually experienced and has had time to reflect, unpack, and learn from. If there’s tons of bitterness and the story ends up as someone else’s fault, it’s probably someone you don’t want working for you.

I’ve never done interviews, but for me a fellow crew member gets lots of points when they admit fault with something that happened and has the self awareness to come away better from the situation vs just pointing fingers.

 

[ChasenSFO]

I think TMAAT questions are also a good way to judge self awareness. I’d imagine it’s pretty easy to judge a “canned” or even a fake story from one that the interviewee actually experienced and has had time to reflect, unpack, and learn from. If there’s tons of bitterness and the story ends up as someone else’s fault, it’s probably someone you don’t want working for you.

I’ve never done interviews, but for me a fellow crew member gets lots of points when they admit fault with something that happened and has the self awareness to come away better from the situation vs just pointing fingers.

When I did interviews that I actually had a say in running (ramp, customer service, cabin cleaning, wheelchairs, cargo), I threw out what the vendor and Widget wanted me to ask and just asked TMAAT questions and stuff then went down that road to try and get a better sense of the person. If they were a good candidate, I'd get them relaxed and see that they probably work hard, are dependable, and probably smart and capable. If they started telling inappropriate stories and stuff, I'd go along with it genuinely interested, laugh, ect, but no way I was hiring them as we had enough immature teens going home sick all the time and not coming to work. Even though we were just hiring agents, I was looking for future leadership the same way airlines are hiring captains and not F/Os when they interview pilots. This also lead to me going way off script. The airline and the vendor were pretty pissed (as they were about most anything I did the Chasen way), but to this day SMF leadership is full of people I hired as agents or came in and promoted from being agents.

Likewise, I was always honest with candidates. Interviewed this one dude after the fall of Afghanistan who was a safety director for Kam Air (the airline famous for having one of its A340s overflowing with desperate people at the gate), he had just immigrated to the US with his large family...and in quite a hurry. This Ramp Sup job paid like $20/hr and would take at least 1.5 months before the SIDA bs and stuff when he'd see his 1st check. When I raised these concerns and asked if this would work with his life, he was surprised and it ended right there and he was grateful. I told him if he changed his mind, the job was his, but that he'd be stuck in this role with no raises in sight for the foreseeable future (though the General Manager was livid I didn't pitch BS about a quick promotion). Everyone else was like "WTF is wrong with you, he was the best candidate", but I mean, we're all just people. Me being at work trying to staff a company doesn't mean your life doesn't matter to me. Things go better when we treat each other how we want to be treated. But a certain airline called it me being a teddy bear with no backbone.

Garbage in, garbage out.

 

[Richman]

Thermgoddamnics.

I used to think so, but then I met biochemistry.

 

[Oxman]

Hello pilots. I'm currently working on CFI and I actually applied and got interview for aviate program.

So until the day of the interview, I heard many examples and expectations from CFI's in my collage. Both someone who have applied, and who is in it. I tried to practice and prepared for it. But unfortunately I did not get in.

During the interview, I had a question saying "Tell me about the time when you made someone respected." At first, I really got confused. Like am I supposed to tell when "I" made someone respect "me"? I asked to the interviewers to make it sure. And they said yes.

I was still struggling and tried to pull out some words from my memories. I told about my experience as I have lived in all over the place in the world so I have an understanding to different people different culture and stuff. and that made someone respect me.

*I'm still 20 and dont have a career with aviation. So HR questions' answers would be mostly from my flight training and my non-aviation stories.

What was I supposed to talk about? What are they expecting from this question? I want to be more prepared for the interview next year so I would like some advices here please .

Buy this book and go through it. There's a section of common HR questions.

 

[Toobdrvr]

Hello pilots. I'm currently working on CFI and I actually applied and got interview for aviate program.

So until the day of the interview, I heard many examples and expectations from CFI's in my collage. Both someone who have applied, and who is in it. I tried to practice and prepared for it. But unfortunately I did not get in.

During the interview, I had a question saying "Tell me about the time when you made someone respected." At first, I really got confused. Like am I supposed to tell when "I" made someone respect "me"? I asked to the interviewers to make it sure. And they said yes.

I was still struggling and tried to pull out some words from my memories. I told about my experience as I have lived in all over the place in the world so I have an understanding to different people different culture and stuff. and that made someone respect me.

*I'm still 20 and dont have a career with aviation. So HR questions' answers would be mostly from my flight training and my non-aviation stories.

What was I supposed to talk about? What are they expecting from this question? I want to be more prepared for the interview next year so I would like some advices here please .

You are already on the right track: Looking for ways to improve and succeed.

For many of these questions, the focus is not whether you give the “right” answer, rather the process by which you got to your answer. They’re trying to get to know you, and an excellent way to that is to ask you a question you may not have contemplated before. That way, they can see you “think on your feet”.

Sure, it’s great to have some answers/ stories to have at the ready (“Why do you want to work here”, “Why should we hire you”,”Tell me about a time”, etc), but it’s also important to be able to just be your everyday self and have a pleasant conversation with them. Practice, practice, practice…

Whatever you do, do not get discouraged. Especially this early in your career. We’ve all had failures, setbacks, and obstacles. Those who pick themselves up, dust themselves off, and find ways to move forward succeed. Every one of them. There are many communities that exist to help you (like this one).

Please keep us updated on your progress. And keep the questions coming!!!

 

[A300Capt]

I never ran out of pencils at test time, just knowledge. I dropped Calc 2 three times before passing with a C. I was required to take Calc 3 but a sympathetic soul let me take a Discrete Math class instead.

I always copied my homework in pen. It was never equated to brilliance.

I was a Psych major. I can tell you *How I feel* about math! It’s hard and makes me *feel* stupid!

 

[dustoff17]

I was in Ralph's. 18 or 19 items in my cart. No one else in line, no one nearby... went to the 15 or less lane. Cashier counts my items and starts arguing with me. I point out back that their job is to check out customers, not police arbitrary restrictions when no one else is using the lane... and the lane was clear. More pushback ensues. I go full Karen and offer to get a manager. Eventually, my transaction is completed.

Respect was earned by bachelors and househusbands throughout the free world. Zombie Adam Smith rises from the grave to give me a high-five.

Not only do I want to know when I start, I'm ready for a raise.

Or you could have complied and gone to the correct lane to begin with!
YOU were wrong at the onset but you when “Karen” on the cashier? She was doing her job and you dumped on HER!
You must be so proud of yourself…….

In the OP, the asked question was,
“Tell me about the time when you MADE someone respected."

VERY porely worded question, but could it be that they were searching for you to tell them when and how YOU respected someone else. Maybe in a situation in which you made them feel respected whether they deserved it, needed it, or not! Maybe in doing so you were able to help them save face in front of others or resolve a situation at hand. THIS is a harder thing to do in the work in the work place than to talk about how YOU gained respect.

I don’t know, but maybe this was the point of the question…

 

[form810]

Hello pilots. I'm currently working on CFI and I actually applied and got interview for aviate program. So until the day of the interview, I heard many examples and expectations from CFI's in my collage. Both someone who have applied, and who is in it. I tried to practice and prepared for it. But unfortunately I did not get in. During the interview, I had a question saying "Tell me about the time when you made someone respected." At first, I really got confused. Like am I supposed to tell when "I" made someone respect "me"? I asked to the interviewers to make it sure. And they said yes. I was still struggling and tried to pull out some words from my memories. I told about my experience as I have lived in all over the place in the world so I have an understanding to different people different culture and stuff. and that made someone respect me. *I'm still 20 and dont have a career with aviation. So HR questions' answers would be mostly from my flight training and my non-aviation stories. What was I supposed to talk about? What are they expecting from this question? I want to be more prepared for the interview next year so I would like some advices here please .

Uh.. roh, roh, Rorge! Collage? Is that a school you attended, or are we talking about some new age, multi-media, paper-mache lesson plan you created?

I was not a psyche major, but I have a bad feeling.

 

[dustoff17]

Uh.. roh, roh, Rorge! Collage? Is that a school you attended, or are we talking about some new age, multi-media, paper-mache lesson plan you created?

I was not a psyche major, but I have a bad feeling.

Be really careful casting that first stone!

 

[form810]

Be really careful casting that first stone!

En Garde! No! Not meow...

There are spelling mistakes and typos that are common. Then there are a row and two letters away on the keyboard. Then, finally, their/they're/there are uni-... uni-... uni-... cowwwage gwadooates. Sometimes you hit, say, the engine heat instead of the engine & wing heat. But you don't typically confuse the anti-ice and the lights.

And, pray tell precisely why I should be careful in an environment in which pretty much everything I say is disparaged? I'm kinda inured to the suck...